ELP - Emerson Lake & Powell (1986)

When I originally heard that ELP were to reform but with Cozy Powell on drums my heart sank – I was a big ELP fan and especially a fan of Carl Palmer’s flamboyant and technically astounding drumming on their early albums. Unfortunately Palmer was busy with Asia and so Emerson and Lake had had to seek out another drummer for the new album but I couldn’t quite understand why they settled on Cozy Powell – admittedly he’d done some reasonably nice stuff on the early Jeff Beck albums but the vast majority of his output was at best sadly lacking in finesse and technical merit and if, rumours of the band seeking a drummer with a ‘P’ for a surname had any foundation, I was hoping for Ian Paice!

Looking back, what I hadn’t taken into account was that ELP had changed – the complex time signatures and frantic instrumentalisation had gone and, furthermore, that Carl Palmer had really lost his way . . . in a BIG way . . . and no longer played in the style of his earlier ELP days. To his credit, Cozy Powell actually turns-in a good performance on this album throughout (and his interpretations of early ELP pieces are also worthy of note for those who’ve heard the Sprocket Sessions rehearsal tapes) and certainly stronger than Palmer’s when he returned to ELP subsequently – but I digress!

The album opens with the the unremarkable The Score, Learning To Fly and Miracle which, as was to be increasingly the case with ELP, are largely Greg Lake tracks backed by E and P without much scope for the old-style improvisations that abounded in their early releases.

Track 4, Touch And Go, is a real diamond in the rough however, and whilst of a relatively ‘radio-friendly’ style – featured a powerful riff from Emerson with Powell’s pounding drums really adding to it’s impact (the track was also a single from the album).

The album then drifts back into Lake-led mediocrity with Love Blind. Fortunately, Emerson provides a jazz-piano based number next in Step Aside which swings nicely and has the odd glimpse of the musical ability of Emerson – along with a very subtle performance from Powell. However, just as you think things are looking-up, the blandness returns with avengence on Lake’s Lay Down your Guns which wouldn’t be out of place on a Barry Manilow album!

Finally, a return to their early inspiration is rediscovered with an interpretation of Holst’s Mars The Bringer Of War which is mediocre but, by when you’ve endured the album thus far, is quite a standout moment! And then, at last, some cacophonous chord bashing from Emerson with attacking drums and uptempo instrumentalisation for The Loco – Motion . . . great! But alas, it suddenly turns into the Gerry Goffin and Carole King-penned Locomotion played on the cheesiest keyboard sound ever and is absolutely catastrophically bad . . . really, really bad!

It is with some relief that Vacant Possession arrives to close the album – an average AOR affair from Lake – but after The Loco – Motion, it is relatively enjoyable. In fact I think if I’d penned a song to follow The Loco – Motion it wouldn’t have seemed half bad by comparison . . . although Vacant Possession does have an awfully out of place keyboard solo in it.

I have to confess that listening to this album again some 20 years after I last heard it has really brought back the horror of just how bad it was/is: in actual fact, such is it’s awfulness (just a percentage point above ELP’s Love Beach album) that the only real positive was Cozy Powell which, when considering my opening comments, is something of a revelation – I feel quite sorry for him having to provide backing to such tripe. Consider buying it just so you can have the pleasure of throwing it away!

• Keith Emerson – Keyboards
• Greg Lake – Bass/Vocals
• Cozy Powell – Drums